The E. T. A. Hoffmann Thread

[Extollager]

J-Sun and JDW, I've enjoyed the way you turn this story around and look it over. Has anyone here read Robert Aickman's unfinished novel The Model? I have a vague impression that it might be somewhat a la Hoffmann. Perhaps Lovecraft's obsession was with weird stories while Hoffmann and Aickman are all about strange stories. The latter would tend to be more elusive than the former. But rather than prematurely trying to define the difference, I'm going to hurriedly throw out examples of stories that seem to me to belong to one or other of the categories.

Weird stories: The more populous of the two types -- lots of Poe here, all of Lovecraft, lots of old-time radio drama....

Strange stories: probably several stories by De la Mare; various stories by Aickman, such as "Into the Wood"; Machen's "N"; Charles Williams's Descent into Hell; Phyllis Paul's Twice Lost...

 

[Extollager]

It's interesting that you see so much humor in the story, Extollager. The story opens with N expecting K & L to laugh at him and encourages them to do so. Without consciously seeming to echo this, K says she could almost laugh about it in her reply and, when the author breaks in, he says he could almost see something funny in one way of telling this "not at all comic" story. I personally didn't find much intentionally funny, but it's definitely threaded through the story somehow.

I was thinking particularly of the way Nathanael is utterly captivated by the automaton, largely because this beautiful dummy is such a good "listener." Perhaps this comes across more in the translation that I read than in some others.

One could easily feel sorry for him, and in a real-life situation that would be better than laughing at him. But there's a literary mode in which we are meant to laugh at the misadventures of gulls, stupid people, and so on.

Two examples of the difference between real life and art:

"Greedy for Tweety," the Warner Brothers cartoon in which the little bird, Sylvester the cat, and the bulldog are laid up with casts in the hospital, and the latter two keep sneaking out of their beds to go and whack the other fellow's cast with clubs and so on. I think this is hilarious.

The mishaps that shower down upon Paul Pennyfeather and other events in Waugh's Decline and Fall. I once recommended this book to a student, who came back and said how sorry he felt for Paul. Perhaps the students' response was to his credit, I don't know. It wasn't the reaction I expected!

 

[J-Sun]

On the weird vs. strange, I haven't read any of the 'strange' camp you cite, but I think I know what you're getting at. I don't know how applicable it is but Kafka, if he's either, is completely strange and not at all weird. But he's often so abstract and surreal that he may not really belong in the discussion.

On the humor part, I had a background, almost subliminal, impression of humor in the discussion with the automaton, particularly on her end with the scintillating dialog of "ah, ah" but not to where it would really register. I think my reaction is partly conditioned by how it starts with a letter from a guy in distress and then relates the letter-writer's childhood experience of the tragic and frightening loss of his father in what seem to be supernatural terms. (The rationalist interpretation of (al)chemical experiments is there, but it seems to the boy as if a demonic entity is turning his father into one and they're up to who knows what evil sorcery.) So, while he's seen to have negative character traits, it starts as a serious story evoking a sympathetic response and the negative traits just show he's not an "ideal hero" - far from it - but not necessarily someone I'd laugh at. Plus, all "society" is seen as accepting the automaton as real, though some later claim they "knew it all along", as the expression goes. He's far more taken with her than others, but it's hard to single him out for ridicule just for believing it real - the ridiculous is that, even at close range with long conversation, he still doesn't realize. But the story is "strange" enough that I just kind of accept the dissonance.

On the other hand, yeah, the classic WB cartoons are great. There's many a "classic of literature" I'd sacrifice before those cartoons if I had to choose.

 

[Extollager]

....I think my reaction is partly conditioned by how it starts with a letter from a guy in distress and then relates the letter-writer's childhood experience of the tragic and frightening loss of his father in what seem to be supernatural terms.....So, while he's seen to have negative character traits, it starts as a serious story evoking a sympathetic response and the negative traits just show he's not an "ideal hero" - far from it - but not necessarily someone I'd laugh at....

On the other hand, yeah, the classic WB cartoons are great. There's many a "classic of literature" I'd sacrifice before those cartoons if I had to choose.

Good point about our initial impression of Nathanael -- as a character for whom we should feel much sympathy. But then I think we're meant to feel some sympathy for Malvolio too -- but also to laugh at him!

Literary works we would sacrifice before we'd give up those cartoons? I'd start by pitching the whole corpus of Restoration theatre and throw in Thackeray's Vanity Fair....

 

[Extollager]

What good comments on "The Sandman"! However, this thread has been quiet for a few days, so....

Shall we proceed to Hoffmann's "The Mines of/at Falun"?

I intend to read this today or tomorrow and to jot some comments here. "Mines" seems to be a little shorter than "Sandman." I hope everyone who commented on "Sandman" will be on board for this one, too.

The natural third story for the Hoffmann thread is the "Nutcracker" one,

which we'd be discussing around Christmastime, so maybe we could start discussing that around the 21st or a little later, to give everyone a chance to read "Mines" too.

 

[Extollager]

https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&...aXNzZXkwOTEwfGd4OjQ2NmZlOTM5YTk2YTEzYWQ&pli=1

This appears to be a nice, readable text of "The Mines of Falun." Took a little hunting to find this, but it seemed like it had to be out there online somewhere!

 

[Extollager]

I've now reread "The Mines of Falun," but I'm not sure that there's much interest right now in discussing Hoffmann. This seemed more of a weird story rather than a strange story to me (cf. message #41 above)!

 

[J-Sun]

I'm not sure that there's much interest right now in discussing Hoffmann.

I don't know if there is much in terms of number of potential contributors but I'm still willing, personally. But true on the "right now" - I haven't read it yet and may not get to it until after the holidays. (I'm reading other things now and should probably even put those aside and get busy.) But I'll post back when I have read it.

 

[Extollager]

I propose that, in a week, people who are interested meet here to discuss Hoffmann's story "The Golden Pot." The text is available online (see below) for those who don't have other access to it.

http://www.horrormasters.com/Text/a0355.pdf

 

[J-Sun]

Did we give up on "The Mines of Falun"? I haven't read it yet but could possibly try it tomorrow or the next day. "The Golden Pot" looks a little long to me (79 pp in my book, compared to Falun's 24) and I'm not actually in the Hoffmann zone, but just squoze "The Sandman" in to play along with the thread.

 

[Extollager]

As far as I could tell, "we" gave up on a discussion of "Mines"; and I know that I personally let go of the idea of a discussion of the story, though I did read it. If anyone wants to discuss it anytime here, but perhaps especially between now and time for "Golden Pot," that would be great.

I'm tempted to say, about "Mines," that there seems to have been a golden age of about a century and a half in which writers of science fiction and fantasy imagined strange subterranean realms, with this story being an early one. Here are some others that come to mind:

apparently the end of Poe's Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym

the goblin caves in George MacDonald's The Princess and the Goblin

the subterranean portions of Kor in Rider Haggard's She -- blazing mummies and all

Lovecraft's "The Mound" (this was nominally a ghost-written story, but my impression is that it is basically HPL)

O'Neill's Land Under England (a little-known classic -- if that is not an oxymoron -- well regarded by Tolkien)

The extended underground sequence in C. S. Lewis's beautiful Perelandra

I'll suggest that the end of the underground realm fantasy came with Tolkien and his Moria, in The Fellowship of the Ring (preceded by the portion of The Hobbit beneath the Misty Mountains, where Gollum lurked). But if a book for young readers may be admitted, there's Alan Garner's Wierdstone of Brisingamen, with that dreadful bit underground when the child is stuck in the tight underground tube -- brrrrrr!

Was Wyndham's ("Harris's") Secret People any good? I've never read it.

 

[J-Sun]

As far as I could tell, "we" gave up on a discussion of "Mines"; and I know that I personally let go of the idea of a discussion of the story, though I did read it. If anyone wants to discuss it anytime here, but perhaps especially between now and time for "Golden Pot," that would be great.

Okay - I probably won't get to "Golden Pot", but I'll try to give "Mines" a go before then.

I'm tempted to say, about "Mines," that there seems to have been a golden age of about a century and a half in which writers of science fiction and fantasy imagined strange subterranean realms, with this story being an early one.

I'm not sure how big a deal it was in the pulps but I'm sure there are many more examples than I can think of. I know Hamilton had a couple of "spooky green phosphorescent underground cavern" weird tales and Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser spend some time underground. These are usually combined with underground rivers or lakes. And, of course, probably different in being so thoroughgoing but Burroughs' great Pellucidar was a subterranean realm. So much of a realm that it didn't feel quite so "underground" as most examples, though. Hm. And then, long after your target area, but I recently read Martin's "Dark, Dark Were the Tunnels" which puts me in mind of many apocalyptic stories such as Kessel's "A Clean Escape", even, though that latter also doesn't have the definitive "feel". ("Tunnels" certainly does.) But many Strangelove-like bunker stories would qualify as a more modern variant.

 

[Extollager]

Well, look, let's hold off on beginning a discussion of "The Golden Pot" -- if anyone's interested & able to join in -- till the first of Feb.

 

[Extollager]

I probably won't be ready by Feb. 1 after all...

 

[J-Sun]

Yeah, I definitely won't. This is how I have books sitting on my shelves for a decade - it takes me a month or two to even read a short story sometimes.

I finally read "The Mines of Falun". I have to say (SPOILERS, of course) that some of the writing, such as when Torbern is first ensorcelling Elis Frobom (should have been spelled Elisfrobom, the way he's called that so often) is quite good in terms of metamorphosis - the stars of the sky into the glitter of ores in the roof of the earth - really fantastic. And yet the underground realm didn't come alive beyond that - it generally seemed like a hole in the ground, pretty much. And while I felt some sympathy for and complexity in the "Sandman" guy, this character did seem like a bit of a drip. I also couldn't get the worlds - sea and earth; above and below; true "comfortable" upstairs vs. combo nightmare/bliss downstairs - to really line up in meaningful orbits. It seems to cover some of the same turf as "Sandman", but maybe less well - same weirdos popping up into a drip's life and the same pointless awkward romance that ends in destruction. Actually, there's a bit of the "weirdo pops into the story and swerves our rudderless protagonist" in all three stories I've read, though "Ritter Gluck" was fun in that regard. "Gluck" and this and really all three have these moments of Dickian "reality melts and are we going deeper into weirdness or ascending back to a semblance of normalcy" but never quite go fully Palmer Eldritch (or generally get back to truly solid ground). Just kind of hovering.

The more I read and think, the more I think what j.d. said Lovecraft said was on target.

Also becoming less sure of my translation. I felt this had a little bit too much of a monosyllabic, metronomic rhythm to the prose with a bit of sing-song fairy-tale voice - maybe something like it is intentional but this felt like a bit much. But I glanced at the Gutenberg translation and, while it seems more fluid, it seems all kinds of messed up otherwise. (That's a problem with foreign-language works - it's like listening to music with construction work going on or watching an old TV that's never had its screen cleaned - always a sense of something in the way - even if the translation is perfect, I can't know it is, so I always wonder.)

Anyway - still interesting and still with a great element or two, but less interesting to me than "Sandman".

 

[Extollager]

I'll be reviving this thread with comments on some further Hoffmann stories. It would be nice to have some company. I look to read and comment on "Doge and Dogaressa" soon. I don't know yet if it is fantastic or not.

 

[Extollager]

I managed to finish Hoffmann's "Doge and Dogaressa," but this proved to be a tedious short novel of Italian intrigue that I won't read again, I'm sure. It has a slight suggestion of supernaturalism at the end, the idea that the Venetian sea avenges itself for the death of the old man who was "wedded" to it by pitching a ring into the water. I trust the next story will be better -- "The Golden Pot."

 

[j d worthington]

"The Golden Pot", though having much of Hoffmann's quirkiness, is definitely an interesting little read.....

 

[Extollager]

I finished "The Golden Thread." The editor's introduction (Oxford World's Classics paperback) helped me to see that the bizarre transformations and so on were more than improvisations. It seems a bit "Hermetic"!

 

[GOLLUM]

I finished "The Golden Thread." The editor's introduction (Oxford World's Classics paperback) helped me to see that the bizarre transformations and so on were more than improvisations. It seems a bit "Hermetic"!

You mean the Golden Pot? Anyway I better get my skates on and read my Hoffman collection so that I can contribute something to this thread in the New Tear...which the Mayans I'm happy to report managed not to derail....

Aside from the classic Tales of Hoffman, I also have Golden Pot and other stories so this should be enough to keep me going...as well as a couple of other stories as I recall.